Tony_the_tiger
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- Jan 3, 2011
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Ruger SP101: Buffalo-Barnes SB XPB 140 .357 Velocity and Jug Test
The purpose of this post is to report on the performance of Buffalo-Bore's Buffalo-Barnes branded Tactical Low Flash Short Barrel XPB 140 Grain .357 Magnum in the Ruger SP101 as measured by a Competition Electronics Prochrono Digital.
10 shots were fired at approximately 10' from the chronograph. The temperature was exceptionally hot Florida summer weather! Here are the results:
String: 1171, 1172, 1184, 1166, 1168, 1182, 1184, 1160, 1214, 1187
Descriptive Statistics:
Buffalo Bore advertises this load as traveling at 1149 ft/s out of a 2.5" S&W Mod 66. For today's test we were using a 2.25" Ruger SP101 KSP-321XL.
We can visualize the spread of this distribution via a boxplot with whiskers:
The shaded area is the interquartile range, which is inclusive of 50% of the shots fired. The dark line in the shaded area is the median. In this case the mean (not shown) and the median are very close, despite a high outlying shot at 1214 ft/s. This string had the lowest standard deviation of any of the other rounds fired on 9/20/2013. Nice!
A single round of this ammo was fired through a 4.2" Ruger GP100 and clocked in at 1244 ft/s.
Using the SP101 KSP-321 XL, a single shot was fired into a row of one gallon water jugs. No denim or other material were used in the test. This round penetrated through 4 jugs of water and gave the 5th jug a shove that knocked it over but did not penetrate. The round was recovered in the 4th jug of water which had two leaking holes in it as well as the hollowpoint.
Suffice to say Barnes reputation for consistency of expansion with their all-copper bullets is well deserved!
These results do not predict the bullets performance in other media.
This was my first time shooting the SP101, and I was not as accurate with it as I would have liked today. You can see I started off shooting a little high but was able to bring the sight picture down to get some good hits in the black and red zone. These 10 shots were the same used for data collection with the chronograph.
I'll be taking this one back to the range for some more practice.
I really like the profile of the SP101. It is sporting original compact rubber grips with aftermarket horn inserts. The horn was obtained from a sustainable source from domesticated water buffalo in India. I made every effort to determine that the horn was obtained legally and not from poaching.
Ruger SP101, the big man's little gun...
Discussion: The velocity I obtained from the tests in a 2.25" barrel exceeded Buffalo Bore's published velocity for this round from a 2.5" barrel on every shot.
Barnes has taken to loading their own ammunition under the VOR-TX brand. Barnes publishes their own .357 loading of this round at 1175 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. This Buffalo Bore - Buffalo Barnes load achieves comparable velocity from the 2.25" snub.
Federal loads the same bullet in their Vital-Shok brand of ammo at 1400 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. As mentioned previously, BB also loads it at 1519 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. This lower-recoiling, low flash short barrel version seems to be able to penetrate and expand in water while retaining its weight at the current speeds.
Switching caliber for a moment, Corbon loads a .40 S&W 140 Barnes XPB at 1200 ft/s out of a 4" semi-auto for their DPX brand of ammunition. I'm not sure if the 140 XPB in .40 is the same bullet or profile of the 140 XPB in .357, but this BB load has comparable velocity to Corbon's engineered 140 XPB in .40 S&W.
Velocity isn't the whole story, and I appreciate BB producing some high quality, low flash short barrel rounds.
So far I really like this round for the SP101. It has promising characteristics that in my opinion would make it a good urban carry load in the SP101 and other heavy but short ccw revolvers.
Thanks for hearing me out,
-Triple T
The purpose of this post is to report on the performance of Buffalo-Bore's Buffalo-Barnes branded Tactical Low Flash Short Barrel XPB 140 Grain .357 Magnum in the Ruger SP101 as measured by a Competition Electronics Prochrono Digital.
10 shots were fired at approximately 10' from the chronograph. The temperature was exceptionally hot Florida summer weather! Here are the results:
String: 1171, 1172, 1184, 1166, 1168, 1182, 1184, 1160, 1214, 1187
Descriptive Statistics:
Buffalo Bore advertises this load as traveling at 1149 ft/s out of a 2.5" S&W Mod 66. For today's test we were using a 2.25" Ruger SP101 KSP-321XL.
We can visualize the spread of this distribution via a boxplot with whiskers:
The shaded area is the interquartile range, which is inclusive of 50% of the shots fired. The dark line in the shaded area is the median. In this case the mean (not shown) and the median are very close, despite a high outlying shot at 1214 ft/s. This string had the lowest standard deviation of any of the other rounds fired on 9/20/2013. Nice!
A single round of this ammo was fired through a 4.2" Ruger GP100 and clocked in at 1244 ft/s.
Using the SP101 KSP-321 XL, a single shot was fired into a row of one gallon water jugs. No denim or other material were used in the test. This round penetrated through 4 jugs of water and gave the 5th jug a shove that knocked it over but did not penetrate. The round was recovered in the 4th jug of water which had two leaking holes in it as well as the hollowpoint.
Suffice to say Barnes reputation for consistency of expansion with their all-copper bullets is well deserved!
These results do not predict the bullets performance in other media.
This was my first time shooting the SP101, and I was not as accurate with it as I would have liked today. You can see I started off shooting a little high but was able to bring the sight picture down to get some good hits in the black and red zone. These 10 shots were the same used for data collection with the chronograph.
I'll be taking this one back to the range for some more practice.
I really like the profile of the SP101. It is sporting original compact rubber grips with aftermarket horn inserts. The horn was obtained from a sustainable source from domesticated water buffalo in India. I made every effort to determine that the horn was obtained legally and not from poaching.
Ruger SP101, the big man's little gun...
Discussion: The velocity I obtained from the tests in a 2.25" barrel exceeded Buffalo Bore's published velocity for this round from a 2.5" barrel on every shot.
Barnes has taken to loading their own ammunition under the VOR-TX brand. Barnes publishes their own .357 loading of this round at 1175 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. This Buffalo Bore - Buffalo Barnes load achieves comparable velocity from the 2.25" snub.
Federal loads the same bullet in their Vital-Shok brand of ammo at 1400 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. As mentioned previously, BB also loads it at 1519 ft/s out of a 4" barrel. This lower-recoiling, low flash short barrel version seems to be able to penetrate and expand in water while retaining its weight at the current speeds.
Switching caliber for a moment, Corbon loads a .40 S&W 140 Barnes XPB at 1200 ft/s out of a 4" semi-auto for their DPX brand of ammunition. I'm not sure if the 140 XPB in .40 is the same bullet or profile of the 140 XPB in .357, but this BB load has comparable velocity to Corbon's engineered 140 XPB in .40 S&W.
Velocity isn't the whole story, and I appreciate BB producing some high quality, low flash short barrel rounds.
So far I really like this round for the SP101. It has promising characteristics that in my opinion would make it a good urban carry load in the SP101 and other heavy but short ccw revolvers.
Thanks for hearing me out,
-Triple T
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